This project has been a lifetime in the making, every since I came across of the Lima 2-6-0 that ran in my Grandmother's home town as a kid - the same mill town (Endeavor, PA) where my father ran his sawill. It ran long enough (1938) to even have a local silent movie of it made that I saw. This was the "signature" locomotive for the little Hickory Valley railroad. This 2-6-0 was also my first steam kitbash attempt in N, where my Rapido 0-6-0 was redone into something more resembling it. The success of that attempt made the module possible, that made it into MR, that got me into more geared steam.... A few years ago I managed to find, with the help of the California State Railroad Museum, the blueprints for the locomotive as delivered. It was a "Standard Plan" 2-6-0 of 1910. Imagine my surprise when I scaled it out and found out that the basic mechanism was dead on for driver size and spacing with the Atlas/Micro-Ace 2-6-0. And unlike the Rapido, it was well detailed and not crude looking at all. Another piece fell into place with Chris333's work on his Atlas 2-6-0 making it into a scratchbuilt Baldwin 2-6-2, and showing just exactly how a tender drive could work, and work well, with the Atlas chassis. When I took this on I decided to at least evaluate the potential for a kit, and when I'm doing that, I don't give away what I'm up to. Well, now a year and a half into the idea, I'm starting this thread. The good news is that it's up and running. The bad news is that this thing is such a complete bear there is no way in the world this could ever survive being a kit - just too difficult and expensive to do. It won't ever work with the original motor, and if you add up the NWSL driveline parts, the Faulhaber motor, the Kato caboose chassis for the tender...and all the cast parts....and a 2-6-0 to work from...yeah. So in the idea of at least moving along N scale steam and encouraging scratchbuilding, I'll post the progress here. I think the concepts are wildly applicable, and Chris333's approach IS REPEATABLE by mere mortals. I want to emphasize that while I have some stuff to add, most of the basic design is absolutely a repeat of what Chris did on his 2-6-2 that Jerry DeBene now has. It's important to emphasize that over the last year I've tried three motor/gearhead drives and two boilers and had a lot of trouble with this and almost quit several times. It wasn't until I got this far and tested it pulling trains that I was convinced this idea actually works and is worth finishing. It is quiet, slow enough, powerful, and is right on for dimensions against the drawings. I'll post the two photos of where I am 'now' and then show some of the component shots and let it evolve both forward and backward. I also like to remind people that the most sophisticated tool I own is a Dremel. You don't have to own a milling machine to do this.
If you take the boiler off the standard Atlas 2-6-0, this is what you've got: It has a traction tire on the third axle. It is fully split-frame, and will run without the tender, just not very well. So there's no way that motor is staying, and I need a more modern tender anyway. I've used Kato trucks in kato frames for a variety of tender projects before, and they work great. For this one, I need about the shortest tender imaginable. So this is just how short you can cut a Kato caboose frame down and still used the pickup wiper system. And that's just critical, because this thing has to work smoothly. So 8x8 on the tender and 5 of 6 on the locomotive is necessary. Here was the original concept: One of the biggest surprises is to realize that the Micro-Ace 2-6-0 is really oversized. It is a Japanese model of a narrow-gauge 1870's 2-6-0 made in the US and sold to Japan. So while it looks tiny, it should even be tinier. When you scale it out, I found out it was actually LONGER than my prototype 1910 'medium' mogul, particularly in the dimension behind the rear driver. That motor hangs out in the Micro-Ace, but it is WAY too long on mine. So it has to be a tender drive, no other way about it.
After watching what Max M did with the 0-8-0, and having Gizmozone endorse the idea by commercializing the Mashima and gearhead drive combination, I initially decided to go with that as the powerplant. Good high-quality drive and gearhead. A little 'tall', but I figured I could always bury it under a coalpile: I actually made it a long way with that combination, but the shock was that it was a) way slow (the Atlas 2-6-0 has another reduction inside the chassis) and b) way too noisy when I had to run it at full tilt to even get 20mph. Man alive, that combination put out a racket! So I finally had to admit it simply wouldn't cut it, as much as I liked the idea. The next test was to try the Gizmozone 5:1 2700 rpm gearhead, as that has worked well in my Tomytec Whitcomb switcher projects and are very quiet. The 3v motor that comes with them can be replaced with the Kato 11-105 12v motor. Surprise, same problem. That gear reduction in the Atlas chassis means the gearhead motor had to be just screaming. Well, the one thing I'll say about my Motorman Faulhaber motors is that they are a) dead silent when running and b) never overheat. If there's enough torque to keep the motion steady, they are a heck of a powerplant.
After the gearhead motors dissapointed me, I did have a leftover Faulhaber 0816, and one of the ones rated at 9v. Having tested these in my geared engines before (both the 28-ton Shay and the 30-ton Climax have one in) I was pretty comfortable with the incredible quality and efficiency, and the fact you can't hear them run at all. So while I expected it to be 'too fast' I wasn't sure about how it might work on the low-end torque. So I put one in the drive as a test, and even without a gearhead, it ran really well and I could control the speed well. I tested it with both the transitor throttle and the filtered straight 12v I use on the HV. All you could hear was the clicking of the rods and wheels over the joints, and it had great slow speed. The universals are NWSL, and so is the steel shafting and the short steel worm. I used Atlas bearing blocks and carved out a space for them in the frame halves. I dremeled out the rear bearing area to fit in a standard Atlas diesel bearing block. Chris showed how to make a brass retainer to hold down the rear block as a clip so the worm train lifts out. Worked great, it engages the Atlas worm fine, and I filled up the gaps with NWSL .010 washers.
That is good to hear. I really wish there was a 2:1 gearhead out there so we didn't have to choose between too fast and too slow. I really like the proportions of this loco.
There are two 'gotchas' on this project - first that while I have loco drawings I don't have tender drawings. I have no good side views either. What I did discover is that they used a standard Lima tender, and that it shows up on other rod Lima locomotives of the same era. I got some good views from other builders photos. The second gotcha is that the locomotive as built in my drawings has a wood cab. I found one picture of it in the wood cab on the HVRR, so it was delivered that way. But at some point it got a Lima-built steel cab added. Note the rounded windows and rounded cab sides into roofline, that appears to be a single sheet wrapper, I sure can't find any seam at all between the side and the roofline. My father took this picture in 1936: Take a look at that pilot and dig the all-purpose coupler box with link and pin and a knuckle. Another odd feature is that the sand dome appears to be the same size as the steam dome, and I did it that way on the model. Shays of that period also had rounded cab windows, but I've had no luck getting dimensions. The overall conclusion is that it was the same overall size and height as the original wood cab, just steel, and I'm guessing at the curves and radiuses. If anybody has ever seen any drawings of a similar Lima cab I'd be deeply indebted. The locomotive itself is highly utilitarian and unornamented, except for the steel cab - which has rounded edges everywhere. I'm guessing about 1915 on the steel cab judging by Shays of that year with similar details. If you look at the right and left sides, you'll also notice the incongruity of a single-banger air compressor and yet a main reservoir that's comparatively large - 18" x 9 feet. This locomotive was used both on the common-carrier interchange lumber trains and on log trains, but the log trains didn't have air brakes. In the background of that shot you see the elevated sorting trestle of the 'lower' mill at Endeavor, the lumber was cut on a high cut deck and the little hand carts rolled cut lumber down to drying piles up to a mile away. The big pipe over top appears to be a steamline back up to the dry kilns.
The cab is really difficult. I thought about modifying another Rapido one, but when I measured it the dimensions were way off and wide. The fact that the entire cab and roof sides were made from ONE SHEET of steel with no visible seams, curving up and over the roof, well, that made it interesting. Then throw in curved-top windows. But this is one of the places where lots of extra time pays off; it's like the eyes on a painting, you either get it right or blow it entirely. Basic approach was to build a frame - a stiff one, and put the .010 styrene wrapper over it. I've had trouble with thin styrene deforming with excess glue, and with it cracking under stress. Step one was to build the ends, cut them ready, and build a 'box frame' with lots of styrene spacers between for strength. Step two was to make a wrapper, mark it in pencil, put it around the frame and try to figure out the window locations based on the bottom of the cab. Once I was satisfied with the penciled on dimensions, I scored them lightly but didn't cut through them.
I glued it on last night, without much cement, actually, and held it on with celophane tape until it dried. That kept the roof curves consistent. Once it dried, I gently finished scoring through the cut lines with a #2 blade, and popped the ends and windows out of the wrapper. After I got that in, I gave it a good sealing inside with ACC. That really locks down the .010 wrapper, seals the gaps, and doesn't dissolve the thin styrene like solvent does. Wanted to show this in some detail because making locomotive cabs isn't impossible, I've made a lot of them now, and I think this is repeatable.
That looks fantastic! Almost made like the real one! I can tell this is going to be one beautiful model!
OK, next steps to put in the cab windows (piece-fit with styrene strip), fit the cab to the boiler, and see if this looks right... The 'fuzz' will get trimmed after the glue hardens. After the windows got in, you can see that I'm also loading up every spot I can find with lead; that gets epoxied in. Then its a matter of trimming and fitting the front cab wall so that it slides on the boiler. One of the goals is to be able to see inside the cab; the boiler should end where the boiler should end (backhead), and you can see across. So I won't fill the entire cab. Now to see if it 'looks right'
Here's the comparison to the original 2-6-0 boiler: Now for the acid test, putting it on the frame...see how it looks To me, it looks 'high', the ruler confirms that the back of the cab roof is about 6" high off the railhead, so all dimensions get re-examined here. The cab's right, the back of the boiler is right, so maybe it isn't flat....? This is critical to me because I'm really 'eyeballing' the tender body in relationship to how the cab looks - things like that the basic 'top' of the tender edge is about halfway up the cab windows - that's the proportion.
Even though I'm not into steam or super tiny, I simply have to recognize the craftsmanship going into this. Wow, Randy, just WOW!!
It looks high to me, too. After using my ruler and looking around, I began to think that maybe the cab is set too high up. Maybe some needs to be shaved off the bottom of the cab--which may mean re-doing the front of the cab as well, since you've already cut it out for the boiler.
If you look at the 'through the cab' shot, and look at the line of the boiler compare to the top of the cab roof - you can see it. It's tipped forward. I swear I can't see it except in that picture, but it is there. I filed the back cab wall down, checked it with a micrometer, it's flat now. Top of rail to back cab roof is now 11' 10", drawing says it is 11' 9" on the wood cab, that's close enough for me. One of the basic problems in N is that the camera is a better tool than the eye. I learned a long time ago to start taking pictures of a project way before it was done, because stuff that didn't look right could have been corrected earlier. So under the 'lessons learned philosophy' that's an important part of scratchbuilding.
Randy, I'm not sure but it looks like the whole boiler is the problem. It's not setting down in the saddle for the steam chests and the walkways look rather high above the drivers and steam chests. I'm not sure how hard that is to fix but that is where I would look.
The original steam chest 'line' for the Atlas/MicroAce boiler was much lower. I haven't bothered carving that off yet. Normally I'd be concerned, but when I have the actual locomotive drawings that show the boiler center at 6' 11 5/8" to top of rail, I'll go with that - and I'm right on. The Atlas boiler measures 5'9" center of boiler to top of rail. The other critical dimensions like top of rail to top of boiler, etc. all scale out OK. The drawing I have has the steam dome, not the sand dome, on it. The Detail Associates Lima dome is as close as I'm ever going to get, so I'll go with it - (Edit - I just discovered that's part of the problem - it's 30" in diameter but 3" too short). The Lima had 44" drivers; the MicroAce has 42" drivers and bigger flanges. Lima's dimension (one of those maddening things) noted on the drawing was "12'10 7/8" top of rail to top of stack (straight stack only)". Knowing that the Radley-hunter dropped over the straight stack, I'll give it six inches and I came to 13'5" on the model. The distance from the top of the boiler to to top of the cab is now right-on at 32", and the distance from top of rail to top of boiler is right. But that's the bugaboo here, even though it is 'right' it doesn't 'look right'. The bottom of the cab windows is roughly on the same line as the centerline of the boiler. Mine is looking about 3" high. That can still come off the bottom of the cab at this point, but I've got to study this more. I'm doing the steel cab to the wood cab dimensions and that appears to be the fatal assumption here. I set the window height the same as the wood cab. Hmmmmm. And that raises a bunch of issues on what you do when you actually have drawings, and you're not sure if the prototype was changed or not when you study photos. In this case I have drawings of the wood cab, not the steel cab, but I'm keeping the same overall clearances, guessing that Lima would have done the same. And then this is a 'standard plan' drawing I have - did they actually change it on the shop floor in some way? Climax did that kind of nonsense all the time. And these are big honking erection drawings that now cover my desk. I was supplied the Lima erection drawing in 3/4" = 1'. I'm still stunned they exist. I'm used to eyeballing everything or working off of HO-sized plans. Now I get to the tender, and I don't have any drawings, just photos. I have some pretty neat parts to work with, so the question becomes do I size the parts to the guess? I'm working between a set of assumptions based on photos and the reality of the model tender frame length.
Rather than finish-detail much more, I want to get the basics done, and the basics include the tender body. Here's the best shot I've found of the tender, taken by then-teenage railfan Victor Norton in 1938 at Endeavor -he'd heard the railroad was closed and went to get pictures, dissapointed he didn't get to see it run. This is one of the last dated, verified, shots of the locomotive: This gives me a lot of detail about the tender. Note the heavy, inset frame, and the really close truck spacing - I've got that. The pipe at the rear is for water siphoning from creeks - remember this is a logging locomotive. (and the siphon hose is hung on the tender frame on hooks) And like the front, a dual-purpose knuckle and link-and-pin coupler pocket. I have one shot of the wood-cab version pulling a full log train, tender first. The other thing this clearly shows - is what looks to be fresh holes across the tender top. The 8x10 that this was scanned from (showing more detail) looks almost like big bullet holes. I don't know what hit it, but it could puncture sheet steel and knock paint off. The 'white' is fresh steel underneath. I don't think I'll model that, but there's a story I wish I knew. If you look at the shot at the top of the thread, the holes show in that too, and its supposedly a 1938 shot. I don't 'think' Victor had a telephoto lens, but that angle really shows the character of the locomotive - big cab, big stack, big air reservoir - reminds me of a kid playing dress-up. Another interesting detail that this angle shows is what looks to be a big canvas roll-up curtain under the cab roof for winter operations. The cab 'sunshade' on the engineers side appears to be nothing more than a piece of banged-up steel jury-rigged over the curved arch window.
